“Gender identity refers to a person’s sense of fitting into social categories”: Wisdom for the Youth of Today from GIRES (Gender Identity Research and Education Society)

April 18, 2016

The following gems are excerpted from GIRES’ submission to the proposed new NHS Service Specification (“treatment guidelines” to you and me) for the UK Gender Identity Development Service for Children and Adolescents (GIDS). The ‘fitting-youth-into-social-sex-categories-development-service’ in question operates out of the Tavistock and Portman facility and is run by Dr. Polly Carmichael.

The clinic, which attempts to treat children who are disturbed by sex-based social roles with pharmaceuticals, has quietly posted two items on their website for public feedback without notifying the press or public. The deadline for replies is April 20.

NHS Gender Identity Development Service for Children and Adolescents – proposed service specification

The second item is a 62-page proposed service specification (treatment pathway) for the kids and teens referred to the clinic. No huge surprises. The usual circular definitions, which avoid outlining specifically what is actually being “treated” (“Gender Identity is an individual’s personal experience of their own gender”, LOL). The usual confusion and conflation of sex with gender (“biological natal gender” OH MY).

It is truly amazing that 50 years of existing work on gender: Analysis of what gender is, how it functions, its specific characteristics, modes of violent enforcement, harms, and lived experiences of such, is completely ignored because the authors of those five decades of work are Women. Lesbians. Feminists.

Holy shit.

The proposed new GIDS service policy does mention obliquely in the most understated way imaginable that massive numbers of adolescent lesbians are seeking escape from sexual objectification and pornification and second-class humanity by adopting “anything but female” identities en masse. (“Gender identification is diversifying!”). (“The number of adolescents referred to specialized gender identity clinics for GD appears to be increasing. There also appears to be a corresponding shift in the sex ratio, from predominantly favouring natal males to one favouring natal females.”) (“Social and sociocultural explanations are offered to account for this recent inversion in the sex ratio of adolescents with GD.” ) COUGH.

And that trans-trending is now a subcultural teen fashion statement for entitled tumblrite millenials weaned on non-essential daily prescription pharmaceuticals that form their consumer identity every bit as much as the brands of clothing or carbonated beverage or types of piercing they express their core selves by sporting (“Yet it is also true that many youngsters who present to gender services are not acutely distressed”) LOL.

They also manage to note the absurdly high concurrence of social category dysphoria (gender identity malfeasance) among individuals who are less likely to observe social norms, ie. those on the autism spectrum. And that most “transgender” children will desist in adulthood. And that “social transition” in childhood results in distress, fear of teasing, and shame for those who wish to revert. And that a potential outcome of treatment for 2% (one youth out of 55 study participants in the only existing outcome study) is death due to complications from surgical castration and genital reshaping.

The largest transgender industry lobbying group in the country, GIRES (Gender Identity Research and Education Society) has already posted their response. GIRES is run by a straight non-transgender couple, Bernard and Terry Reed. Bernard has an MBA from Oxford and serves as treasurer. Terry has a degree in Physiotherapy (occupational therapy) and serves as secretary. They started the group after their son, Niki Reed, suffered harassment when he transitioned on the job as a carnival ride operator and went on to win a groundbreaking 1997 employment tribunal that created precedent for transsexual individuals to sue on the basis of sex discrimination. (Chessington World of Adventures ltd v Reed, 1997)

Niki is heterosexual and went on to marry his female partner as a legal male. He does not publicly support the group his parents started and seems to have dropped out of sight. In all their public appearances his parents never speak of him.

What’s interesting is that GIRES is basically part of the UK government. They are “partners” with the Surrey and Borders NHS Partnership Foundation Trust which is their largest funder, and they co-produce educational materials on gender for providers together [PDF].

In addition, GIRES claims at least 79 “corporate members” of their group, including the Office for Nuclear Regulation, Imperial College London, South East Coast Ambulance Service, Learning and skills improvement service, Royal College of Nursing, Royal College of General Practitioners, among others. They were awarded the Orders of the British Empire in 2010. They donated over fifty thousand dollars to WPATH (World Professional Association of Transgender Health) ostensibly to fund foreign language translations of the lobbying group’s standards of care. They are the establishment. A revolutionary besieged minority group fighting the power they are not. They are the power of the state. They are the state.

Who’s your daddy? Bernard Reed wants you to take those hormones, misfit!

Gender identity refers to a person’s sense of fitting into social categories of boys/men; women/girls. These are binary identities, but identities may also be non-binary, that is somewhere on a spectrum between the two, or outside that spectrum, known as non-gender. More of these widely diverse identities are now emerging, and many will be needing the support of medical services.

Gender dysphoria describes the unease experienced when the gender identity is not aligned with the sex assigned at birth: the gender role and expression typically associated with that sex are also sources of unease.

“Although no studies to date demonstrate the mechanism, multiple studies have reported associations with gender identity that support it being a biologic phenomenon.[…] Current data suggest a biologic etiology for transgender identity” (Saraswat et al 2015) [sic]

———————————-

[Page 4 Skip the blockers]

Cross-sex hormones are acknowledged to be effective in treating gender dysphoria (which hormone blockers are not).

—————

[Page 4 Hormones are harmless]

N.b. Cross-sex hormones are partially reversible.

—————————-

[Page 4 Failure to attempt correction of sex role nonconformity is like waterboarding]

Delaying treatment causes “Psychological torture”.

—————————

From a GIRES and NHS partnership pamphlet.

———————–

[Page 5 Give kids who are still in the closet at puberty hormones]

It is not always possible to know whether gender non-conforming behaviors in a child are actually a reflection of gender dysphoria, or whether they are related to some other possible outcome, such as being gay, lesbian or bisexual. Usually, at the onset of puberty, the outcome becomes clearer to the child, and therefore to the relevant adults, including clinicians if they are already involved.

—————————-

[Page 5 When in doubt: prescribe hormones]

The argument that the possibility of ‘desistance’ exists, is neither relevant nor a rational excuse for withholding cross-sex hormones. ‘Desistance’ should be completely detached from decisions about cross-sex hormones.

—————————–

[Page 7 Hormones cure autism]

Anecdotally, young people who have been successfully treated, are often described as having no residual ASD [Autism Spectrum Disorder]. The symptoms have disappeared once the dysphoria has been treated.

——————————

[Page 9 Actual death is a scare tactic compared to threat of potential self harm due to waiting for hormones]

The tragic death of a young person is not really a useful anecdote in this context. All surgeries carry risk, but unless you give the figures to show how many have had surgery, sometimes several surgeries and survived, mentioning one death is not meaningful. It seems like a deliberate scare tactic.

————————–

[Page 9 Hormones are the grail, the truth, the light. Nonconformity is death]

Preventing premature death would be overcome by providing cross-sex hormones to overcome the misery of gender dysphoria [sic]

————————–

[Page 9 Social sex role nonconformists provoke abuse upon themselves.]

Refusing timely interventions for adolescents might prolong gender dysphoria and contribute to an appearance that could provoke abuse and stigmatization

There are boatloads of data out there these days suggesting that fertility drugs contribute to a number of serious health problems for the infertile adult women who take them, even though they’re taken for just a few months. Dropping a few celebrity names, they’re believed to be the causes of fatal cancer for Gilda Radner and Elizabeth Edwards. Many of these drugs, such as Lupron, are the same drugs we’re putting these transgender children and adults on for years, or even for their entire lives. How exactly do we expect the outcomes from this to be good?

Since gender is about socialization, and autism is in part about socialization in a way not setting well with people, could that be the real connection? I’ve long seen myself as slightly (though not at all entirely) immune to socialization cues, because I kind of just don’t or didn’t notice them.

The idea that medical transitioning could be inflicted on autistic people is indeed incredibly disturbing.

I apologize if this de-rails the topic, but I’m starting to understand why I loathe third wave feminism as well as the modern interpretation of intersectional feminism.

I knew there was a reason I wanted to keep my feminism about women’s issues and now I know why. Granted, I came from a conservative background, but I’m recovering from that. I may be liberal, but trans activist bullshit is why I can’t get behind third wave feminism and why I support second wave feminism.

Second wave feminists have solidarity, encourage sisterhood, and know when to call out the bullshit when necessary.

This proposal is absolutely appalling! Meanwhile, childfree women can’t even get a fucking tubal without a fight with their doctors! There was one woman who had to fight for 4 fucking years to get her tubes tied. When she did, everyone was vilifying her for “draining the NHS for her selfishness,” yet I hear no screaming about this trans bullshit! This is so wrong and just shows me that sexism is alive and well. It sickens me how third wavers can get behind this and can tell someone like me to “check my privilege” when trans people are being killed or are suicidal for demanding people go along with their mental illness.

I forgot to add, I don’t want to see trans people dead, but I do think they need help. I mean, getting suicidal because you believe you were born in be wrong body? That’s the definition of mental illness right there. They need to unlearn sexism and homophobia. As do the rest of society. Those are the real issues. The sooner people abolish gender and sex roles, the better off we’ll be.

“Refusing timely interventions for adolescents might prolong gender dysphoria and contribute to an appearance that could provoke abuse and stigmatization.”

Women who aren’t seen as attractive have to put up with abuse and stigmatization–not to mention they tend make less money than the more beautiful. Should we pay for free plastic surgery for all of them–and let’s include face lifts for older women!–to improve how they’re treated? And, if not, why should we worry about whether transwomen get treatments paid for by insurance–either early with hormones or later with FFS–so that they’ll be more attractive? If they’re no different than other women–as they keep telling us–shouldn’t they be expected to pay for their own plastic surgery and beauty treatments? [Omit feminist rant on the unfairness of insurance paying for FFS and SRS when so many women have trouble getting basic health care needs met.]

This topic particularly angers me. Because of decisions made by the pharmaceutical industry, health care professionals, and my parents, I’ve had a minor facial disfigurement since early childhood, which has “provoked” both abuse and stigmatization. I’ve faced decades of the sort of reactions people have to a girl or woman whose face doesn’t look quite right, not to mention employment problems and, more recently, chronic pain (the latter courtesy of the same bad decisions), yet I’ve had younger, liberal female acquaintances claim I’m more privileged than some guy who wants to put on a dress and coerce lesbians into sleeping with him because I’m straight and supposedly “cis.” (“But at least you’re not rejected for your gender identity” was one response.)

My own experience has reduced my ability to feel sympathy for those who go around in a state of narcissistic self-pity–and increased my contempt for their enablers. (Oddly enough, even as a teenager I didn’t act out and threaten suicide because I didn’t like my appearance or people’s reactions to it.) Given what happened to me, I’m also enraged at what the transgender industrial complex is doing to children. Although the mistakes’ effect on my appearance was apparent almost immediately, the other health issues developed later, and I see the trans fad leading to unforeseen long-term complications for some of these young people.

People seem to expect more rigorous studies on the treatments given to children who might actually die of cancer than they do of those provided to supposedly transgender children. Does this mean they consider same-sex attraction or even simple gender non-conformity a fate worse than death?

Thank you for saying this all so well. If male-to-trans are indeed ordinary women, let them self-pay for their cosmetic surgeries or forgo them, just like average women do. For some reason, those of us born female struggle to get basic health care needs met. We have to argue with our insurance companies over the most mundane and medically necessary treatments. Yet, these men can waltz right in and have a $90,000 SRS upon request. Then they can get facial feminization surgery, breast implants, and Viagra— all of it paid for, no questions asked, and no gate-keeping. It is almost like one sex’s wants, needs, and preferences always wind up superseding the other sex’s wants, needs, and preferences. Yet, we call this progress and liberalization. Go figure.

Hi Oak and Ash: Regarding face lifts for aging women, I agree that there should be parity in health insurance coverage. Aging women, as well as women with polycystic ovarian syndrome, often acquire sagging facial features, bigger noses, thicker facial hair, rougher skin, flattened eyebrows, thinning head hair, wrinkled hands…in other words, traits that society considers masculine. Couldn’t all this confuse these women’s “female gender identities”? Don’t they also deserve to have “gender confirmation surgery” on their faces and hands? And if the answer is No, why is it Yes for the “women” identifying as MTTs?

“It is almost like one sex’s wants, needs, and preferences always wind up superseding the other sex’s wants, needs, and preferences.”

You’re right, and I’d go a step farther. In a patriarchal society, men’s desires tend to take precedence over women’s needs. Autogynephiles’ insistence that their fetish matters more than our safety and privacy is just the latest example.

There’s definitely screaming about the trans bullshit, but it’s censored by the mass media. The Daily Mail doesn’t censor to protect the trans quite as much as, say, the Guardian, so you’ll see commenters complaining about the NHS wasting resources on this crap.

The NHS does require a long wait for surgery, at least, but it’s still not good enough for something that’s a non-medically necessary lifestyle change.

Ahh I see. Well, I’m glad Daily Mail isn’t censoring this shit out of fear of the SJW mafia.

It shouldn’t be allowed at all. They need to get help. Not mutilate themselves. Having a tubal is different from being trans. Having a tubal is merely a permanent form of birth control that many childfree women desire so we don’t have to worry about getting pills, IUDs, shots, etc. Everything functions the same and we acknowledge the fact we’re female. We just simply don’t want to be pregnant or go through childbirth.

Transitioning is denying your biology and frankly, misogyny from both ends from what I can see. Trans men are women who are sick of the sexist bullshit that the patriarchy puts on women so they think being a man will make it easier when they could’ve just given the finger to sex roles. Trans women are men who have this mixed idea about what being female means. They think it means wearing dresses, getting access to lesbians and bi women, and doing every other stereotypical thing that the patriarchy puts on women. As this blog as pointed out, many of them are autogynephiles and it’s utterly repulsive!

I doubt the Daily Mail is more dedicated to free speech. I think they post their trans stories as clickbait, and leaving comments untouched means more reader participation and more ad revenue. That’s how you know most other news sources are deep in the trans cult; they’re alienating readers and forgoing ad revenue to make sure these men are never challenged.

Hi IronBatMaiden: Regarding tubal ligation for women in the US, all one needs to do is read the childfree groups online to see how difficult it is for childfree people to get sterilized. Childfree women as old as 36 are told they’re “too young to make such a serious decision” and are declined, even if they want to self-pay. Meanwhile, these same women suffer serious side effects from temporary birth control methods such as the Pill, and/or get accidentally pregnant. Yet these “trans” children are being given surgeries and medications that will not only sterilize them, but cause a multitude of other permanent changes. It’s baffling.

I had a tubal at thirty after 3 kids. I had to basically beg my provider, wait thru a three month ‘cooling off’ and even then, they insisted on doing a version of the procedure that could be reversed, I was even told by one (woman) doc that even though I didn’t want more, and neither did my then-husband that “I might meet someone else and want more kids then.”

I fought it thru, spent three horrible months on depo as a ‘trial’ while waiting for the tubal and finally got control of my reproductive system. I cannot imagine how hard it would be for women who are childless/younger,etc.

Un-fucking-believable!! I can’t believe they did that and you have kids!! Ugh!!

At least they gave it to you.

This is one of the reasons the work of second wave feminism is never done. Because we as born women have to fight for the right to control our own reproductive systems! The right wing misogynists will stop at nothing until they control us! As whacky as the left has become with the invasion of the trans activists, they’re our only allies when it comes to bodily autonomy!

You’re right. It’s appalling. Like I mentioned, it’s nothing more than sexism and the patriarchy at work.

@Jessica: Boy does that sound familiar.

I mentioned earlier that I came from a conservative background and became liberal and feminist. I don’t advocate for trans activism at all. I thought it was leftover transphobia from my upbringing, but as it turns out, there was something more.

It’s pretty parallel to the conservative version where the pro-liars try to lie to women about what a fetus looks like at a certain stage in pregnancy and harass them with it.

Notice some similarities:

Trans activists:
•Science-denying
•Expects everyone to submit to their whims and beliefs
•Harasses and threatens anyone who disagrees with them.
•Misogyny

Pro-liars
•Science Denying
•Expects everyone to submit to their whims and beliefs
•Harasses and threatens anyone who disagrees with them.
•Misogyny

Let me get this right: to help and aid those who have minds and bodies that are still growing and may be following a fad…that hormones are RECOMMENDED??????Are you kidding me????

Let’s ignore that when used for their intended purposes in youth and otherwise, there are at least 32 different side effects associated with them. (this is when they are used to treat imbalances or inflammatory illnesses). Let’s also ignore that the minds of many youths are not fully developed and giving such chemical cocktails can stunt the growth….emotionally and in other ways. AND if one thinks this is a bad situation now…wait a few years.

While there will be a few where this will work…more will be left with bodies that will fail on various ways, much earlier than expected. More will have enabled via medication …mental issues. And the odds of these being reversible over time will be less and less. While in the PDR, etc….there are hints these can be reversed (and those require a great deal of followup)…the odds of there being any full remediation of this, are like those of the Chicago Cubs winning a World Series. Which is to say…….NONE.

Reblogged this on There Are So Many Things Wrong With This and commented:
“These are binary identities, but identities may also be non-binary, that is somewhere on a spectrum between the two, or outside that spectrum, known as non-gender. More of these widely diverse identities are now emerging, and many will be needing the support of medical services.” This is pathologizing diversity any way you look at it. I’m looking at you, “progressives.”

Yep. Exactly what sort of “medical services” do the sparklegender snowflakes need? Lipgloss implants? If they’re outside gender how do they need their bodies changed? Unless we’re talking about neutrios wanting their castrations.😖Holy fuck.

Micro-tiny silverlining: GIRES have absolutely tippped their hand that they are insane fanatics. Who airily wave away desisters. They don’t just want the people who supposedly ‘need’ this to get these treatments. They actively want people who do not need it and will suffer because of it to transition. Crazy crazy crazy.

“The argument that the possibility of ‘desistance’ exists, is neither relevant nor a rational excuse for withholding cross-sex hormones. ‘Desistance’ should be completely detached from decisions about cross-sex hormones.”

OMG. How on earth can they 1) cast doubt on even the existence of desistance, let alone the evidence of high desistance rates when youth are not socialised toward an expectation of lasting trans identity, and 2) state, “’Desistance’ should be completely detached from decisions about cross-sex hormones.”

GIRES are actually dissing even ALLOWING the most basic of ethical considerations, and the most elementary of questions about whether people should be treated as individuals, whether there are in fact differing underlying causes for people’s gender identity to become questioned. (Duh!) They seem to deny even the possibility of child/teen patients suffering future regret, loss or grief over how hormones changed them. (Do they even know the irreversible effects of ‘transition’ levels of testosterone on females, or are they just thinking of the guys?) Are they really so ignorant of the existence of people who were conned into cross-sex hormones and wish they hadn’t been? And their increasing numbers? Do they even care?

The righteous lack of empathy is breathtaking.

Who are these two people?

When you pull back the curtain on GIRES, isn’t it just basically just two ‘cis’, straight (and heteronormative?) parents who might have been desperate to frame their own son’s trans identity as a ‘treatable medical condition’, and for it therefore to be blamed only on what they believe as immutable biological truths? Deflecting any possibility that trans identities might instead arise for psycho-social reasons, or maybe from anything in their own son’s life experiences? ‘OUR son couldn’t have a problem in his mind (stigma!), so trans identities have to be located NOT in the mind, and must be ‘treated’ by tampering with healthy bodies. And, um, that goes for everyone.’

Parents shouldn’t be looked at askance over gender identity issues arising in their kids, because the social contagion factor is huge, and potential causes are clearly numerous – e.g. girls on the Autistic Spectrum are apparently 18 times more likely to come to believe they must be trans than girls not on the AS spectrum. From a recent article in Scientific American Mind on why autism is different in girls than in boys, and why girls often go undiagnosed:

“In short, the brain of a girl with autism may be more like the brain of a typical boy than that of a boy with autism.”

Anybody can see why that might make an autistic girl vulnerable to the narrative that maybe she was instead a boy. When that idea is out there as never before. Especially if she is groomed by the ‘If you think you might be trans, then you are’ people.

These two drug-pushers seem like they might be channelling their own anxieties about why their son came to a trans identity into forcing their self-serving rationalisations onto everyone else, regardless of any suffering down the line, any sterilisations of children.

You can’t even call it pathological altruism (causing harm when intending to help, right?), because there would seem to be so much self-interest behind what they have done. Pushing GIRES to the level of power that it now has, and over the fate of all UK young people who get sucked into the gender morass.

And of course ‘gender’ self-perceptions are nothing like body dysmorphic disorder, nothing like anorexia, move right along… You must instead treat the special world of disordered self-perceptions about ‘gender’ NOT by addressing the mind’s body rejection, not by aiding body acceptance, not toward re-aligning self-perceptions with physical reality, right? Drug ‘em and cut ‘em. It’s the body that’s wrong, not the mind.

EndTheHarms,
Exactly. They are random self-appointed asshats who have managed to weasel their way into a position of power and influence on real medical policy. It’s a catastrophe. Your description of this is superb. You know what the “if you think you’re trans you’re trans” dynamic reminds me of? Recovered memories of childhood sexual abuse. The people promoting that, including in the mass media just like trans, said ‘if you have even wondered if your perfectly normal parents who you actually like in reality raped and molested you when you were 4 then they did’.

Contrast and compare, regarding things being ‘in the mind’ vs. ‘wrong’ with the body: on Monday 11 April, the Guardian’s front page flagged an article, ‘Why plastic surgery is self-harm’, by Sara Pascoe. In it,

‘Want to know a disturbing statistic? You know I said that all women who have boob jobs are unwittingly part of an ongoing study; well, lots of studies are conducted using their data – health complications afterwards, further cosmetic procedures, etc. And a meta-analysis of all these studies found that women who have had breast enlargements are two to three times more likely to kill themselves than women who haven’t. We need to think about that – about why this is happening, about the vulnerabilities of the women who choose cosmetic surgery and the normalisation of such choices. When they asked cosmetic surgeons about this rise in suicides, they didn’t understand: “They were happy with their operations,” they said; “She didn’t show signs of depression.” But someone who wants to have their body cut open, to pay for it, is already self-harming, carving criticism on their body. The expensive and clever doctors persuade us surgery is more reasonable than razor work in your own bathroom.’

Guardian journalist gets it on plastic surgery, but Guardian turns a blind eye to plastic surgery due to gender perceptions, and to hormonally-induced self-harms from ‘gender’ beliefs. (Even censoring mildly questioning comments, so many people have reported.) Because ‘gender’ is the magic Thing One Must Not Question.

Another recent Guardian article, on anorexia, noted, ‘Many people with anorexia don’t grasp that they are, in fact, sick’. Yes. It also outlines a successful new treatment approach for adult anorexics, as well as teens (FBT, family-based treatment) in which family and friends are involved in helping a patient become healthier, helping realign their skewed self-perceptions with physical reality.

But only anorexics deserve such compassionate treatment, right? The gender-confused must instead be escorted toward attempted self-eradications, and fast.

One detransitioned woman’s take: ‘My transition was a kind of living suicide.’ Another: ‘My regret revolves around taking hormones and what that has meant for my life … I was killing myself slowly, which was kind of the goal, looking back on it.’ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rkTpX2uHIeE

When will people wake up to the harms being done by the gender industrial complex?

‘Want to know a disturbing statistic? You know I said that all women who have boob jobs are unwittingly part of an ongoing study; well, lots of studies are conducted using their data – health complications afterwards, further cosmetic procedures, etc. And a meta-analysis of all these studies found that women who have had breast enlargements are two to three times more likely to kill themselves than women who haven’t.’

@EndTheHarms–That reminds me of the 2011 Swedish study that found more suicide and more psychiatric hospitalizations among those who’d transitioned. (http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0016885) In both cases, I suspect the people undergoing the procedures ihad more profound problems–maybe some combination of mental health issues and not fitting into gendered expectations–disguised by the desire to change their bodies, so the surgery didn’t fix the underlying cause of their distress. It’s another argument against hormones and surgery, but the gender industrial complex makes money, so they’re not likely to give up easily doing on lucrative plastic surgery.

That’s a really good point, Anenome. Autism is considered by sane and informed people to be a sort of developmental variance, not a disease or otherwise something requiring medical treatment. I am likely somewhere on the autism spectrum, and gender conditioning didn’t click well with me, and I got socially punished a lot for this, and when I first heard about transgenderism; I thought “Wow, there is a way out of this torture?”

I was old enough not to consider surgery etc., but that was a complete crapshoot. I was enlightened shortly afterwards by reading this blog and the comments, and soon understood what was really going on. But no one should be expected to have to do all this research in order to avoid medical malpractice.

The comments about autism hit home for me too. One of my kids is on the spectrum and I likely am as well. I was never girly, I hated all the shit that was expected of one to conform. Heck I used to intentionally ‘pass’ as a boy on occasion and I still wear men’s clothes most of the time (although the sundress in summer is a pleasure) and work in a male-dominated field (definitely NOT math).

I went thru a lot of depressive issues as a teen and my parents sought out all those enlightened psychological cures availiable. I never thought I’d say this, but gender reassignment makes anti-depressant therapy look positively benign by comparison.

Facts, to any group that tells people that to be authentic, they have to act, dress and think like they do is like what kryptonite would be to Superman.

Or worse, someone who drank the Kool-aid may yell ‘FACTS…..ARE YOU KIDDING ME?FACTS????’, a la the infamous Jim Mora vent about “PLAYOFFS” years back.

Keep in mind that when the ball starts rolling and folks do wake up to understand they have been lied to, in order to be fair, they will see that this was crafted on the same fashion as….as. Well fashioned like what happened in the middle of the last century.

Hi Gallus, is it OK if I post my animation in your comments? It’s about my fictional Tavistock Clinic psychologist, Dr. Shelby. It’s made with an auto animation program, so the animation is a little crude.

Also thank you for doing the dreary work of digging out these horrifying “gems” of just flat out malpractice. This is absolutely repulsive. I hope medical people write to the NHS and point out that this is all contrary to medical best practises and medical ethics. The principles of which are actually written down in various places.

Thank you again, Gallus Mag. I read the entire, annoying thing–my blood pressure was a little low today and needed the boost.

(page 5)
“Socially transitioned transgender children who are supported in their gender identity have developmentally normative levels of depression and only minimal elevations in anxiety, suggesting that psychopathology is not inevitable within this group. Especially striking is the comparison with reports of children with GID; socially transitioned transgender children have notably lower rates of internalizing psychopathology than previously reported among children with GID living as their natal sex.” (Olson et al, 2015)

I see two plausible reasons for this. The first is that there’s something the child wants to do that members of their sex aren’t allowed, so, of course, they’re happier once they can (and for girls who want to be boys, that something might be “treated as a human being”). The second is that since many paranoid or deluded adults feel less anxiety when others play along with their delusion, why shouldn’t that be true for children? When I first heard about “gang-stalking” (http://atlanta.cbslocal.com/2014/05/17/gang-stalking-and-electronic-mind-control-community-spreads-online/), I happened to read a piece by a health professional who’d found that paranoid people who think they’re being stalked by strangers everywhere they go actually felt less anxiety and subjective distress once they discovered an on-line community of those who held the same deluded belief.

If a child kept insisting they were a dog and expressed great anxiety when their self-identification was denied, would we play along and take the child to the vet for rabies vaccinations and deworming? I keep wondering why no one seems to ask these children WHY they think they’re the other sex.

And I continue to be shocked at what doctors are willing to do to these children with no rigorous research supporting the reality of transgender identity as a medical condition and the benefits of the “treatment” they’re providing.

Very interesting thoughts. I haven’t taken the time to dig into the methodology of that study to determine whether the means used to measure psychopathology are credible at all, but I did notice that there is no control group of children who are allowed to gender nonconform but are NOT “supported in” pretending they are the opposite sex.

Speaking of dogs and delusions, I was just watching a rerun of Keeping Up With the Kardashians. Kim Kardashian’s male Boxer dog kept running all over the neighborhood, humping neighbors and their dogs. The *entire* family except Bruce Jenner wanted to get the dog neutered. He threw repeated hissy fits over the idea. It wasn’t even his dog. A year (!) later, he finally agreed to it as long as the dog could be fitted with prosthetic testicles, a.k.a. “neuticles.”

Jenner’s been coy with the media as to whether he’s going to get genital surgery. I’m doubting he will. If the guy throws a fit over a nuisance dog’s ‘nads getting the chop-chop, there’s no way he’ll be getting carving into his own.

What is this about two percent of these transitioning children dying from surgical complications? That likely doesn’t even account for those who may die years later from endocrine illnesses stemming from the prolonged use of Lupron and other drugs. I’m reminded of Neil Young here: “There’s one more kid who will never go to school, never get to fall in love, never get to be cool.” RIP, kids.

I am reminded of the constant usage of well-known logical fallacies by trans activists. Shifting goalposts constitutes much of it. One could teach a course in logical fallacies using only material gleaned from these people. They are a complete embarrassment to anyone who cares about intelligent debate.

The 2% dying from surgical complications was this: 51 kids was the sample size and 1 out of 51 died from a post-surgical infection. Therefore, 2% of the sample size died. It has nothing to do with future issues. The 2% is the 1 kid with fatal post-surgical complications only. That is how that number was arrived at.

Zemskull, that 2% comes from the oft quoted 2014 Dutch study that alleged to show that 55 kids who transitioned socially at a young age, followed by blockers and cross-sex hormones all went on to have surgery and live happily ever after. What they don’t mention is that the study started out with 70 kids, 15 of whom fell out of the follow up questionnaire process for some reason or another, including the one that died because of complications following SRS surgery. But then according to GIRES it would be scare mongering to mention that.
(4thwavenow has a discussion about the paper here…..https://4thwavenow.com/2016/02/19/the-trans-kid-honeymoon-is-sweet-while-it-lasts/ )

It is truly appalling that GIRES have so much clout when it comes to matters that influence parents and children’s thinking on trans issues. You are so right, Gallus, when you say that ”they are the establishment”. The UK government has systematically failed to examine the truth about what is going on. Thanks for reporting this.

Hi atranswidow: thank you for the clarification. I too want to know more about those 15 out of the 70 original children. To have so many who didn’t get thoroughly documented later is very suspect, and poor science.

The deadline for comments is TOMORROW. Could you maybe put the sentence about the deadline in BOLD, and add that it’s tomorrow?

It’s so important for the welfare of children and young people in the UK who are getting swept into this madness that gender critical thinkers from anywhere make comments! The fact that this was slipped out under everyone’s radar (Transgender Trend learned on the 17th) means there will likely be very few critical comments. Please help if you can.

That’s a good idea, but unfortunately I’m not able to edit the post right now. Ugh. Sorry!
I’m having technical issues because my computer is so old. I actually have to access another computer to post. Except for video posts, which is why I’ve been posting so many of them.
😉
Hopefully I’ll be able to get some new gear at some point maybe later this year.

OT, but an observation I made this morning, Gallus. I’m sure you’re already aware of the musicians who have cancelled their North Carolina dates over the bathroom law– Springsteen, Bryan Adams, etc.

Texas, including Houston, has laws very similar to NC’s, but none of these names are cancelling there. Not a one. Here’s the reason I suspect: Texas has enormous venues — Dallas has AT&T Stadium, which seats 110,000 when the football field is used for seating for a concert. Houston…Austin…San Antonio…all have huge venues. Lubbock, El Paso….the list is also long for the mid-to-large venues. And Texans love a spring or summer music concert–sell-outs, night after night, are common when a band tours the Lone Star state. Country, rock, rap, pop…Texans love concerts. There’s a reason Austin, with its astronomically popular South By Southwest festival, has eclipsed Nashville as the place for any band to move.

It seems to me that these self-righteous musicians aren’t going to make their pro-trans statements when it overly affects their pocketbooks.

Dorothy, very good point! Drives me nuts. Also you were victimized by auto correct. I’m pretty sure you meant “illegal to be gay” in Saudi Arabia. Where incidentally they have public executions with swords. ⚔

Hi Dorothy: That’s a very good point. Several of these boycotting artists are happy to play in Middle Eastern countries in which gay people are hanged or stoned to death, five-year-old female rape victims face “honor killings,” baby girls’ clitorises are sawed off with crude razors, and women cannot vote or drive.

As a kid, I had a GI Joe collection, I hated dresses, loved sports, rode a boy’s dirt bike and got a bb gun for my 12th birthday. No one ever claimed I wasn’t a girl. My parents let me be me and I am today 100% woman who still hates dresses. I don’t get why a parent would be so caught up in gender roles to tell their kid it’s ok to medically erase the person they see in the mirror. Most if not all kids go through some level of gender identity uncertainty weather it be uncomfortable questioning to full on crisis. It almost always passes (though painfully most times) yet these people think it’s ok to cause physical and medical harm over that. And is it not generally agreed that the human brain does not reach full maturity until sometime in the 20’s? Yet we’re supposed to let kids make these life-altering decisions? All of the adults party to these BS should be jailed for child abuse, physical, emotional, psychological.

Had someone tell me the other day that sex is socially constructed (because there are intersex people), and I was sitting there thinking, “Yeah, because every archaeologist and forensic pathologist out there is totally wrong about how sex hormones change people’s body morphology and bone structures. Sure.”

Because the existence of an edge case totally nullifies the entire rest of the normal distribution? I don’t get it. I mean, if a trans person dies and isn’t found until they’re just skeletonised remains, the pathologist is still going to look at the shape of their pelvis, the size of their hands relative to their body, their dentition, the shape of their skull and the size of their lower mandible relative to it, the length and diameter of their long bones, and so on and so on. These things don’t magically disappear because someone changes their name or their birth certificate.

I’m perfectly okay if some adult man wants to walk around in dresses and heels all the time, and even take hormones to grow boobs and stuff, or an adult woman wants to walk around in jeans and polo shirts or whatever and take testosterone, but they’re adults and can make their own decisions about their bodies. But I really draw the line at pitching this stuff to children, and then trying to argue that it’s all a moot point anyway because biological sex doesn’t really exist, so we should just all pretend that their self-ideation is reality. It’s nuts.

This is just as sickening and as illogical a concept as one that came up in a chat a few years ago. As in that, if someone had an issue with renal or congestive heart failure, they can still be given the hormone regimen to grow breasts, etc…because there would be ‘no damage according to the research’. I shit you not….some of the cult followers actually said this, or similar terms…without a challenge.

What we are seeing is how science and facts are being thrown away, so some can get across concepts and agendas that have no connection to reality. Not all participate in this, but an overwhelming majority are that strange. And yeah…if Montague or Leakey…and others who knew the science cold were still alive, they would call the cultists out on their crap.

Many of us do know the science and have the academic credentials, and we do call this nonsense out, but I find it does no good. The cultists will link to misinterpreted (by them) studies, or insist that you are not a real scientist (when your university says otherwise), or claim that they have just as much education (when they don’t), or uncritically copy-and-paste from pro-trans websites, etc… It is not mainstream scientists who believe in this social-engineering, media contagion, trans fad. But contemporary American liberal culture promotes the idea that all opinions are of equal value and should be considered equally, so the unemployed trans activist with a 10th grade education, living in his mom’s basement, is given just as much consideration as the middle-aged, accomplished scientist. This PC stuff is ludicrous and it is impervious to facts.

It will…..but the genetic markers that are in the bones should still be there. My science may be a little rusty, but even if there is facial reconstruction surgery, the original genetic info that created said person can be be found in the bone, thanks to carbon-14 dating, etc.

Sounds like it’s the crew getting upset about it; I’m thinking gaffers, grips, other technicians. These people seem likely to be considerably more down to earth than the creatives. Maybe they should complain to their unions.

It may well be that only the production staff has to put up with this. Actors probably have their own bathrooms as part of their dressing rooms.

I find myself wondering how the hell we lost the women’s bathrooms feminists of the first wave fought for. What’s next in accommodating male fetishists?

Maybe conservative legislation to restrict abortion and contraception is actually of a piece with liberal laws allowing men access to our spaces–that is, an attempt to re-establish control over the bodies of women. That might also explain why so many transwomen target lesbians: with more professional opportunities for women and the legalization of same-sex relationships, lesbian women might seem the greatest “threat” to men’s ability to control us all.

@OakandAsh How the feminist battle was lost…re: bathrooms, equal pay and employment opportunities and other items was and sadly is no different than how other groups, which initially had social momentum lost theirs. This was done via a sad form of social conditioning.

Years back, when for example…..when trans issues were discussed media wise, it was CIVIL. As in via Donohue, Susskind, ‘Look’ Magazine. Yep good old fashioned, reasoned media. And it was through those means that when there were disagreements over issues and tactics, at the very least folks talked. Through that there were chances to find grounds for respect and working towards solutions that could help. Not perfect..but the ball was starting to roll, that is until the ‘me’ and television generation got a hold of the system.

This meant saying, via those said same outlets …that trans issues = feminist issues. And repeating same as often as possible, til the mantra was cemented in the mind. As well as bending same with more eye catching displays of folks dressed in ways, that would only work on the ‘ Minnesota Strip’, with makeup that could be read 200 miles offshore by the ‘Valley Forge’. Slowly but surely this media warping (and this now includes social media) helped a bunch of privileged folks, not just over write feminist issues (race as well…which is tangential..but not the reason for this comment), but to make any dissent ‘hate speech’. Which stinks…

The above may sound like something out of a speech from ‘Network’, but like what was mentioned there is how folks had there ratuonal thinking centers hijacked. To win it back…in addition to taking it to these folks via their same methods, feminists, trans folks who hate the guilt by association and others need to have their own versions of, let’s say….Lee Atwater, who could target the falsehoods in the media, etc that caused feminism ( and other items) to have lost ground, importance…or become a feel-good buzz term, for those with no sense of history.

@gallus…sorry did not mean to post like this. This is the media student in yours truly showing up…and in many ways ticked that things have gotten as bad as they have

Sorry GallusMag, I am new to commenting, and have a tech problem. I would like to add another comment following on from my April 19th 10.16pm one, responding to PetuniaCat’s of 20th April 8.06am, but there is no ‘Reply’ button allowing me to do that, after either. Am I being dense?

@ Gallus Mag
“That’s a good idea, but unfortunately I’m not able to edit the post right now. Ugh. Sorry!
“I’m having technical issues because my computer is so old. I actually have to access another computer to post. Except for video posts, which is why I’ve been posting so many of them. 😉
“Hopefully I’ll be able to get some new gear at some point maybe later this year.”

On the subject of trans issues in the UK–Glosswitch, one of my other favorite writers on gender, has recently come out as a human being.https://glosswatch.com

Maybe we should follow her brave example and openly declare ourselves human beings trapped in women’s bodies. Then we could claim a non-binary idenitity and accuse those who disagree with us of transphobia and hate speech.

@Gallus Mag, this is OT on this post, but I don’t know how else to send you this note.
This is really just FYI because I realize this may not be “news” and not worth posting… it’s nothing new because the New York Times is a black hole of uncritical trans advocacy lately.

HOWEVER.. there is a NYT editorial today which made me explode with anger at the shameless lie it contains.

This is written by Andrew Rosenthal. He is the Editor of the NYT Editorial Page. Not just some flunky. He is the boss. Among other things he writes the following… (TBH I didn’t get any further after reading this part)

“Mr. Cruz is actually talking about laws, passed in enlightened areas of the country like North Carolina, that ban the use of public women’s restrooms by transgender women. These women suffer bitter abuse, bigotry and discrimination in many parts of their lives. Some transgender women are gay. Some are not. None are “adult men.” ”

NONE ARE “ADULT MEN”???

When I regained consciousness I sent a comment saying (something to the effect that) this is a preposterous lie because ALL transgender “women” – except actual intersex, duh – are adult men. And trans need for validation must not override women’s safety. And that this propaganda to institutionalize men’s fantasies is unacceptable in the NYT. And transgender “women’s” problems are male problems so they should fight them on their own turf… And etc., etc….

I doubt they’ll publish it.

But this stark, crazy lie in the venerable “paper of record” made my blood boil…. I had to try.

I read that editorial, too, and was also tempted to put a link here. The whole trans trend seems to be the cause of the day–no doubt because it involves so many white, straight men. Maybe I wasn’t paying attention, but I don’t recall quite so much moralizing condescension in support of gay and lesbian rights, and certainly not for feminism.

Once the major lawsuits hit business establishments and government entities as a result of sexual assault by these MEN, to say nothing about the lawsuits by those who “transitioned” and have had their health destroyed as a result of medical greed, this whole trans thing will be discredited and debunked like the lobotomies of yore. It can’t come fast enough.

In reading same, I wanted to vomit as well. The Times….at least when myself and others were younger….eas about fact checking, even in their editorial pages. Now they have…not just on this issue…but on others have sent the truth on a one-way trip to the bottom of the Hudson River.

As for why they are backing this, @OakandAsh you are right. No different than the overwhelming number of ‘positve portrayals’ which are in social media posts. That is, unless of course the POCs achieve their credibility via the route of the creep who was on MSNBC, etc.

Something says this will only get worse, meaning the media lies. That is, until a female relative of a media member is attacked by one of these creeps in the bathroom or dressing room at a store. Then the fallacy of saying ‘this does not happen’ will come home.

You are spot on about that last sentence — it took the NYT decades to use the word “gay” instead of “homosexual” in their hallowed pages of record. OTOH, once queer theory got going, it took them hardly any time at all to start throwing the word “queer” around.

It’s frightening to see this shit from the opinion gatekeeper at the New York Times. Because it’s equivalent to declaring that the earth is flat. The statement “none of them are adult men” is squarely anti-science and anti-reality.

(Frightening but not surprising, in view of what’s been going on at the NYT in general, for example the overtly anti-Sanders choice of language in purported NEWS articles about the campaign)

“It’s frightening to see this shit from the opinion gatekeeper at the New York Times.”
Yes and it’s done with such arrogance. I complained to the OG and they’ve now put my comments (x5) up against the shitty negative replies to yours.

“(…for example the overtly anti-Sanders choice of language in purported NEWS articles about the campaign)”
I don’t know much about Sanders, so I asked where is Sanders on the trannies? Apparently he’s Jewish, with the Times of Israel calling him the “Rabbi of the Left” and the Talmud taking this stance;
“The Talmud also recognizes that an individual’s gender orientation does not necessarily match his or her sex organs…. Transgender people, subject to many kinds of injustice, deserve our support…. Hormone treatments are to date regarded as extremely low-risk…. Our current understanding differentiates among sex, sexual orientation and gender as three independent variables that can appear in individuals in any combination…. In a world where sexual minorities are subject to ridicule and suicide, we all need to stand up for the full diversity in our communities.”http://www.jewishrecon.org/resource/understanding-transgender-issues-jewish-ethics

Are you kidding?! Sanders may be Jewish, but 1. that does not necessarily mean that he agrees 100% with the Talmud. Does a Catholic necessarily march in lockstep with the Pope 100% of the time? Does a Protestant mindlessly act in lockstep with MLK 100% of the time? 2. The Talmud does NOT say a single word about transgenders. This is a new fad. It is not some ancient thing. The Romans and Greeks wrote about people engaging in homosexual acts, but they did not write about trannies. They did not conflate degrees of conformity to sex role stereotypes with actual biological sex, like modern SJW pro-tranny ideologues do. Again, this is a new fad, spread forth by social contagion and social media– not some enduring truth about the human condition. 3. Not all Jews are the same, just as not all Christians believe exactly the same thing. There is no resource that universally speaks for every branch of Judaism, just like Jehovah’s Witnesses do not speak for every branch of Christianity. Generally, most Jews do not believe in desecrating the body and many would most certainly NOT approve of SRS. There is simply no way to extrapolate Sander’s specific personal opinion from the unrelated link.

@lovetruthcourage – I think, re. Protestantism, you meant to say Martin Luther, rather than Martin Luther King. 😉
I’m not judging – as a born-and-bred (white) atheist, I was confused about those names myself for many years.

Hi, thank you for your reply. My comment was not intended to cause any upset. I was merely regurgitating, somewhat clumsily, what I’d found on the web after a cursory glance.
That said Bernie Sanders is certainly in the trannie camp, no question. He was pushing for trannie rights back in the 1980’s in Burlington and right up to the present day;https://berniesanders.com/issues/fighting-for-lgbt-equality/

Regarding the Jewish aspect of the comment, it is undeniable that there certainly is Jewish involvement in the trans movement, to what degree who can say?
One example is the Jewish site Forward.com that has a page called Forward 50, where it says;

“This is a year when American Jews are deeply, loudly and passionately embedded in some of the most pressing political and social issues in the nation…
From the debate over a nuclear deal with Iran, to the emergence of transgender identity in synagogues and on screen, to the ground breaking acceptance of marriage equality, American Jews are playing a starring role…
ensuring that transgender Americans do not suffer discrimination — was championed in a Jewish day school by a remarkable bar mitzvah boy (Tom Sosnik)”

I’m not saying it’s a bad thing but surely it does not go unnoticed the prevalence of Jewish people within the articles on GT.
For instance the protagonist, David Muscato, in the latest article has a Jewish mother. He states this fact at the beginning of his video “My Book, Your Book, Their Book, No Book” (bad sound quality)http://ytcropper.com/cropped/dt57226d2f3ba5c

In the second article ‘True Trans’ UBC Pride Flag Arsonist Brooklyn M. Fink confesses”
GM asks;
“And what’s with the name? “B.M.Fink”?”
Well one interpretation of the word Fink is that it’s an Ashkenazi Jewish name popular in Brooklyn Newyork.http://history.loftinnc.com/Fink.htm
I wouldn’t say it was too much of a stretch of the imagination for this trannie arsonist to be trying to ingratiate himself with the Jewish community after getting on the wrong side of Antifa – who are in the top left of the Social Media Post in the article. Obviously this is all conjecture 🙂

By drawing attention to these facts I am in no way saying all Jews this or all Jews that, I have no way of knowing that.
You said;
“There is no resource that universally speaks for every branch of Judaism… Generally, most Jews do not believe in desecrating the body and many would most certainly NOT approve of SRS.”
How do you know this?
Thank you for listening.

WHAT ON EARTH.
Yes, some people are Jewish. Some reformist or moderate Jews subscribe to “liberal” social politics.
How does LoveTruthCourage know that most Jews do not believe in desecrating the body? Because even tattoos are forbidden by the Jewish religion. What the fuck is wrong with you? If you can’t reel in your weird far-right aryan “Jew talk” you will be banned. The next time you say the word “Jew” on this blog you will be banned.

” Generally, most Jews do not believe in desecrating the body and many would most certainly NOT approve of SRS.”
How do you know this?
Thank you for listening.”

1. Jews (more Orthodox ones, not all) do not believe in desecrating the body with tattoos, unnecessary bloodletting or surgeries, nor do they believe in cremation or autopsies for the same reason — it is desecrating a body that God made, as opposed to something made by human hands.

Genesis 1:27 “So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.”

Deuteronomy 22:5 “The woman shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man, neither shall a man put on a woman’s garment: for all that do so are abomination unto the Lord thy God.”

Deuteronomy 23:1 “If a man’s testicles are crushed or his penis is cut off, he may not be admitted to the assembly of the LORD.”

Leviticus 19:28 “”Do not cut your bodies for the dead or put tattoo marks on yourselves. I am the LORD.”

Leviticus 22:24, “You must not offer to the LORD an animal whose testicles are bruised, crushed, torn or cut. You must not do this in your own land.”

2. I’m no expert, but I personally know many Jews, including some in my husband’s family, so Jewish beliefs are not so mysterious to me.

@lovetruthcourage
“Hope this helps!”
Nice one, yes it did. The combination of yours and GM’s answers ie accessible Biblical reference and the “reformist or moderate” take, made it much easier to unravel my puzzlement.
I think the Forward50 people that I mentioned who excessively generalised about their influence added to the confusion.
Thanks for taking the time.

This doesn’t have anything to do with this specific clinic in the UK, but it’s sad and deeply disturbing when 14 year old girls are getting “top surgery”. “Top surgery” is essentially elective mastectomies with the surgical trimming down of areolas and nipples.

“Going under the knife, the 14-year-old said later, “was kind of like a dream….More counseling followed, as well as hormone blockers, testosterone shots and constant talks with his parents, Kathie and Ron, and his sister, Jacq. Sam’s struggle has been a team effort..

This female child was born with several medical conditions, and they put her on GnRH agonists and testosterone. At age 14, she had “top surgery”.

“Rady Children’s Hospital San Diego will not recommend surgery for anyone younger than 16 because of the irreversibility of the procedure”….(*Rady Children’s Hospital won’t recommend surgery if they are younger than 16, so just send the kid to Children’s Hospital in Los Angeles – they will “transition” anyone)

The “top surgery” on Sam, a 14 year old female, was done at the Kryger Institute of Plastic Surgery in Thousand Oaks California. These are the butchers who mutilate 14 year old girls. There are other surgeons in California and other states that also do “top surgery” on females younger than 18.

“Safety concerns remain regarding the impact of physical interventions. Although puberty suppression, cross-sex hormones and gender reassignment are generally considered safe treatments in the short term, the long-term effects regarding bone health and cardiovascular risks are still unknown (Cohen-Kettenis & Klink, 2015).”

“The Early Intervention Clinic will continue to follow the research protocol, with the exception that the age of 12 years for the hormone blocker no longer applies and the hormone blockers will be considered for children under the age of 12 if they are in established puberty.”

They are starting the GnRH agonists for children younger than age 12.

“When ethically approved, the service will undertake a research study to assess the physical and psychosocial impact and outcomes of offering cross sex hormones from the age of 15 years for a carefully selected group of clients who have been receiving the blocker for a minimum of two years.”

For some kids at this clinic, the cross gender hormones will start at age 15. In the US and other countries, cross gender hormones have been given to children as young as 11 years of age. There is a gendertrender link to an article that states,

“Nicole was 11 when she decided she wanted hormone therapy to halt male puberty and promote the growth of feminine features. (*how does an 11 year old “decide” he wants hormones) Her parents reluctantly agreed to support her decision, terrified by statistics showing that adolescents with gender dysphoria are at a higher risk for severe psychological distress, self-mutilation, and suicide. And so, for the past two years, Nicole has been taking pills twice a day—spironolactone, which blocks male hormones like testosterone, and estradiol, a synthetic form of estrogen often given as a hormone replacement to post-menopausal women, even though estradiol has been shown to increase the risk of breast cancer. .The youngest person to whom he has prescribed cross-sex hormones was 14, a female-to-male patient…”

All clients attending the Paediatric Endocrine Liaison clinic will receive general fertility advice including the possible effects of taking hormones for future fertility.

The Paediatric Endocrine Liaison Team will provide initial information on fertility options and signpost the client and their family or carers back to their GP who can make an onward referral to licensed NHS fertility specialists for expert advice on fertility options including gamete retrieval.”

When they say “fertility”, what they mean is that they know they are going to sterilize healthy children, and the only way these children will be able to possibly reproduce in the future is via technology. That is what the words “gamete retrieval” is all about. Isn’t it Orwellian to discuss “gamete retrieval” in healthy children as if kids can fully comprehend “gamete retrieval” means. Ok, little 15 year old Jimmy, let’s talk about sterility and “gamete retrieval”. It’s been said on this blog numerous times, but it’s worth repeating. Sterilizing healthy children is a human rights abuse. Children lack the maturity to make rational decisions. The prefrontal cortex of the human brain isn’t fully developed until the early twenties. There is a reason we don’t let teenagers take out bank loans or buy alcohol, but they are supposedly mature enough to willingly give up their fertility and possibly endanger their health.

Children who go straight from the GnRH agonists to cross gender hormones without experiencing puberty are rendered infertile. The germ cells mature during puberty. If children aren’t allowed to go through puberty, a normal part of human development, the germ cells are not going to mature. These kids are never going to have germ cells to use. They have to stop the GnRH agonists long enough to bank sperm or eggs. What happens if the parents don’t take the time to see that eggs or sperm are frozen? These children will never have children of their own. Stopping the GnRH agonists long enough so that 14 year old Johnny can ejaculate into a cup to freeze his sperm is one thing, but retrieving and freezing eggs is far more complicated. This is stressful enough for adult females. To do this to teenage girls seems barbaric, and how do adults explain this to a teenage girl. So, they are going to stop the GnRH agonists, and then basically pump a teenage girl full of hormones, and then stick a needle through her vagina to the ovarian follicle and suck out the eggs. This is my question. How are teenage girls supposed to understand all this? It’s not fun for adult women, and they want to do this to teenage girls.
Below is an informative article from PBS about freezing eggs, or “gamete retrieval”, as if kids would know what this is all about.

“The procedure goes like this: The woman receives a round of hormone injections that stimulate the ovaries to produce multiple eggs. This stage involves frequent visits to the fertility clinic, about five in 10 days, while the ovaries are regularly monitored by vaginal ultrasound. After roughly a week or two of hormone treatments, the eggs are retrieved.

“I think people picture that it’s months of shots and invasive procedures, but in the end it’s a maximum of two weeks,” Knopman said.

The egg retrieval process takes about 10 minutes and is done under mild anesthesia or sedation. Using an ultrasound, the doctor guides a needle through the vagina to the ovarian follicle containing the egg. A suction device at the end of the needle removes the eggs from the follicles.

Retrieving the eggs is technically not that different from getting blood drawn, Noyes said. A needle goes into the ovary and the eggs get gently aspirated out.

“It’s just in a different area of the body: the vagina,” she said. “That makes people eyes bulge when I say it.

While the surgical procedure is mostly safe, the hormone shots do carry a risk of ovarian hyper-stimulation syndrome, or OHSS, which makes some women ill, said Dr. Samantha Pfeifer, chair of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine practice committee. That occurs when a woman responds too aggressively to the hormones and the ovaries become swollen and painful. It can be accompanied by nausea, vomiting and abdominal pain.
When hyper-stimulated, the ovaries produce a lot of fluid, which has to be drained from the abdomen with a needle. OHSS tends to happen in younger women in their 20s and 30s, she said, and occurs in less than 5 percent of patients. But in severe cases, OHSS increases the risk of kidney failure and blood clots and in very rare instances, can be fatal.

What are my chances of having a baby later if I freeze my eggs now?

The chance that a single frozen egg will lead to a live birth is about 2 to 12 percent, according to the American Society for Reproductive Medicine. That’s why doctors often recommend having a couple dozen eggs frozen to maximize success.
Success is based on a number of factors, from a woman’s age to the quality of her partner’s sperm, Pfeifer said. According to one study published in the journal Fertility Sterility in May 2013, a 30 year-old woman with two to six thawed eggs had a 9 to 24 percent chance of one of those eggs progressing to a live birth, depending on the method of freezing. At age 40, that number dropped to between 5 to 13 percent.”

How many children that they knowingly sterilize end up freezing their sperm or eggs, and does anyone know how successful it is? Won’t the years of cross gender hormones effect fertility? Can’t taking cross gender hormones for years impact a person’s ability to impregnate a woman or to conceive?

Why can’t people just say don’t sterilize healthy children? Makes sense to me. This is the ethical thing to do.

Besides fertility, despite what transgender sources say, no one knows the long term effects of GnRH agonists and cross gender hormones on developing bodies. This is a list of possible side effects from testosterone. It’s a typical “Informed Consent “ form that FTMs (biological females) read and sign before the doctor starts testosterone. Children aren’t mature enough to understand all of the possible side effects. It’s ludicrous on its face to assume that children have the mental capacity and judgment to understand all the risks involved. I don’t know if this particular UK clinic uses these types of “Informed Consent” forms, but this lists most of the potential side effects of testosterone. For minors, I’m assuming the parents would sign the form. Scroll down and see where it says. This assumes the child possesses the maturity to give consent.

Thanks for this information. It was very hard to read. It actually made me a little queasy, perhaps not least because of thinking what might have happened to me had this stuff been going on when I was 11 or so, and if there had been all this promotion of the ideas. It’s amazing — we don’t even let underage kids get tattoos or have their ears pierced this easily or with so little oversight.

What you said goes along with not just else has been said by myself and others, who know about the damage hormones/steroids can do when used for their ACTUAL purpose, but what has been posted by others in videos about them. As in why some folks are detransitioning off of them.

I am willing to bet that within the next few years, there will be individual or class action suits about the misinformation that has been spewed. If nothing else will wake the public up, then the number of people suing, looking like the amount of seats in the lower bowl of PNC Park (home of the Pittsburgh Pirates) should.

One MtT username “asg” (age 60, he says) makes numerous comments on this article. Among many other expected remarks, he moans, “Women can and do wear whatever they want: ties, suits, short hair, etc. Men simply cannot. Don’t whine about your gender persecution when you have been so free to express it any way when men can not.”

What a bunch of fucking cowards these guys are!

These GNC males have organized (to an extent) in supporting each other’s efforts to colonize femaleness and redefine it to include men.

Why don’t they organize AS MEN and challenge stereotypes of masculinity!

I wish journalists would start directly asking that question.

I may as well just quote part of my own comment on this NYT column:

“It is truly unfortunate that trans ‘women’, as a group, don’t have the guts to try to break down the imprisoning box of masculinity from within!
That is what these gender non-conforming men SHOULD be doing.
Unfortunately they don’t appear to have the courage and perseverance of the first and second wave feminists, who smashed their way out of the prison of ‘femininity.'”

Ship Rat. Yes. We owe a lot to the women of the late 19th and the 20th century. I know that men who dressed flamboyantly were attacked as gay (and in many cases they were e.g. Quentin Crisp) but, if men had worked together with the same courage and determination as women, they would have the same freedom as women in the west in matters of dress and behaviour.

Impossible to understand how a man can accept strict limits on his dress and behavour as a man but cannot accept any limits once he’s declared he’s a woman.

Hi Siobhan: I was impressed by the comments as well. None, however, assured the reader that her ex has actually been dating a man, not a woman. The ex may be gay or bi, but he’s not heterosexual with this latest pairing. In other words, the writer is wrong that her ex has chosen someone more feminine than her. She’s beating herself up unnecessarily, wondering if she could have kept this guy if only she’d been more into cosmetics and expensive women’s clothes.

Working with young people in a one to one counselling session or wok shop is very different to the experience within education and families. The best parents and teachers recognise that nothing in childhood or adolescence should be regarded as permanent. The emerging adult moves through varying person as, attitudes , identities. Teachers in particular recognise the often pernicious and pervasive influence of cultural, social and peer pressure. Schools are Petri dishes of this, the school environment feeds a lot of insecurity and faulty thinking among children. Educationalists refer to this as the ‘hidden curriculum’, what they absorb today is how there is a right way tone a girl and opting into Trans alleviates them of negative feelings f their peer group and social media doubts their ‘rightness’. In a sentence sexualisation and and the very visual, Internet governed world we live in has robbed girls particularly of joy in being themselves.